


Implications of Nomenclature

by harpydora



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Multi, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-30
Updated: 2013-10-29
Packaged: 2017-12-25 03:44:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/948241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/harpydora/pseuds/harpydora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On a purely intellectual level, Hermann knew it was called a "Drift <em>hangover</em>," but he never had reason to analyze the implications of the nomenclature.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a goofy little fluff piece I did to kind of get my writing flowing. For those of you not familiar with Homestuck, moirallegiance is a sort-of-platonic-sort-of-romantic relationship (Troy and Abed from _Community_ or Holmes and Watson in most incarnations are typically used as examples for non-Homestucks). Not sure if this is going anywhere, so it is not chaptered.
> 
> I follow Travis Beacham's Tumblr, so Vanessa is a model who bears a striking resemblance to Gina Torres. (It is my headcanon that Hermann is married to Zoe Washburne.)

On a purely intellectual level, Hermann knew it was called a "Drift _hangover_ ," but he never had reason to analyze the implications of the nomenclature. Having worked in and around the Jaeger program for the last decade, he was at least acquainted with the visible symptoms of the affliction: the desire for proximity, the queerly synchronous actions, and the proclivity for finishing each others' sentences were all to be expected.

The thunderous headache, on the other hand, was not but probably should have been. ( _You used a Pons unit scraped together from detritus; did you really expect an exemplary user experience?_ Hermann chided himself.) It felt like a kaiju had stomped in his cranium, which he supposed was not entirely untrue. Judging from the muffled groans coming from the other side of his narrow bunk, Hermann was not alone in this state. It also confirmed he was not misremembering the portion of the previous night's festivities where Hermann had dragged Newton bodily from the party in the mess and threatened to _sit on him until he got some rest for Christ's sake._

"I have never, ever, _ever_ been as grateful for your obscene aversion to having fun as I am right now," Newt (there was no way he would ever be Newton or, God forbid, Doctor Geiszler again) hissed into Hermann's mattress. "I don't even wanna think about what a Drift-hangover-with-a-hangover would be like. Did anybody get the number of that train?"

Hermann snorted and rolled his eyes, though the gesture was surely lost on his companion. "I believe the freight train which you feel like ran you over was christened _Newton Geiszler's Overinflated Ego and Underdeveloped Survival Instinct._ " He rubbed absently at his temples, as if it would ease his head. "All right, that's unfair. No one would be alive now if it weren't for your inane desire to self-destruct publicly and spectacularly."

"Christ, I wish it didn't feel like what's left of my brain is trying to smash open my skull because holy shit, you just said something almost nice about me." Newt chuckled weakly. "Just wait 'til Raleigh and Mako find out they saved the world just in time for it to end."

"Oh, please," said Hermann, reaching over to swat Newt's arm without turning to look at his target. "I've said plenty of nice things about you. As you should well know, having seen my entire life laid bare."

"Oh my God, Hermann, how the hell did you get Vanessa to agree to marriage when your idea of a compliment is: 'of all the candidates available, he is the one I least wish to lock in the supply closet indefinitely.' Which isn't even saying you _didn't_ want to lock me in the supply closet. You just didn't want to do it to me as much as you did that Stark guy or what's-her-face, Doctor Hanji."

If it weren't for the fact that Hermann now knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he and Newt respected each other, he might have felt put out. Instead, he just swatted at Newt again. "Hush, you. I now have to live with the knowledge that I will potentially always know what you are thinking at any given moment. Let me just suffer in peace."

Newt huffed and rolled over so he could bury his face in Hermann's armpit. His mouth remained closed, but Hermann could hear him as clear as day. _I don't want to go back to Boston._

"Then don't," came his waspish reply. _You could stay here. Go to Anchorage. Manila. The world is your-our oyster._

"Where are you gonna go?" Newt asked. Though the words are garbled by Hermann's rumpled jumper, Newt's question is perfectly plain. _I don't think I could work without you,_ he didn't-say.

"'This, too, shall pass,'" Hermann responded, knowing he was hedging even before he'd finished the quote. His ability to be honest with himself only extended far enough to know that he would be dishonest if he said that he did not feel the same way. So he left the subject alone. "Vanessa is due around Easter, but you know as well as I do that there is a possibility we have not seen the last of the Anteverse." He chose to ignore the shiver of excitement which coursed through him at the thought, as well as refused to examine its probable source. "I will likely go back to London for a while, at least until the PPDC no longer believes I can work adequately from afar."

"How did you manage to marry a woman like her?" Newt wondered aloud, following Hermann's lead as they danced around what they both refused to give voice to.

"If you mean to imply that my wife is not an intellectually stimulating individual either because or in spite of her profession, I will be forced to introduce the end of my cane to your arse," he grumped. This elicited a bark of laughter from his companion, which he could feel even through the wool of his sweater. He squirmed away, or rather tried, but Newt was resolute in his desire to have his face crammed against Hermann's torso.

"Dude, you'd better believe I would never in a million years imply that Vanessa is not a sharp woman. I'm just wondering how someone so obviously smart _and_ fun-loving looked at you and said, 'yes, this socially-graceless wet blanket will father my undoubtedly genius and attractive children.' I mean, I saw it and I _still_ don't get it."

 _Neither do I, but I am grateful of it,_ Hermann thought. He considered batting at Newt again, but changed his mind mid-reach. His fingers tangled in the hair at the base of Newt's skull instead. "We still have a spare room, even after we remodeled for the nursery." His heart leapt into his throat once the almost-offer had left his lips, and he could not tell if it was in response to his own audacity or in sympathy to Newt's surge of hope.

"I dunno, dude, do you think they'll let me bring my samples into the country?" _Do you think we can pull this off?_

_Pull what off?_

_This whole quasi-codependency thing._ "And what the hell are we going to tell Vanessa?"

Hermann shifted uncomfortably. He'd been in the same position too long, and his joints were beginning to protest. "We will tell her that you and I used some very unorthodox methods to ensure the continued survival of the human species. I believe we can manage somehow."

*****

The video call with Vanessa went better than expected. She only threatened to dismember Newton three times for endangering her husband, which Newt could now recognize as her letting him off lightly. Still, he couldn't help but feel a little bit awkward. He'd met the woman before, of course; technically speaking, he'd known Hermann longer than she had. However, he had never been the target of her full force of personality (not to mention being saddled with the knowledge of what it felt like to be madly in love with her).

By the end of the call, Hermann had mostly smoothed things over, but her full lips remained pressed into a hard line. "All right. I'll agree to this on one condition." Her dark eyes cut over to Newton. "You had better know how to cook."

Before Hermann could open his mouth ( _don't try to pretend you're not about to say something jerkish_ ), Newton elbowed him in the ribs and sketched a hasty salute. "Even if I didn't already know how to cook, I would learn for you."

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Hermann's face twist up, unable to pick a side between horrified and indignant. "Was that a pass at my wife?"

Newton rolled his eyes. "Dude, you've been in my head, you know I don't have any ulterior motives where your wife is concerned-- not that you aren't a great person," he added quickly to Vanessa. "I'm just trying to be friendly!"

"That was a bit more than just 'friendly,'" said Hermann, settling on indignant. He looked for all the world like he'd just walked into the lab to find kaiju guts on his side of the demarcation line (not that Newton had _ever_ made a habit of pushing that particular button). "If we're going to be cohabiting, I will not tolerate you making passes at my wife."

"Are you serious. Hermann, you have to be reminded to _greet people_ , and you're seriously trying to lecture me on social acceptability." He crossed his arms and fixed Hermann with a pointed glare over the top of his glasses. "Why don't you stop and think about how you'd feel if I started trying to educate you on Fibonacci?"

Hermann bristled. "Just because I was often more concerned with my work than social niceties does not mean I lack basic manners. And, might I add that, having been in your head and privvy to your thoughts, I know very well there is not a single useful thing you can contribute to anything related to Leonardo Pisano or his work."

"Yes, Hermann. That is exactly my point. That's what analogies do. They draw comparisons between one thing and another thing that's kind of like it." He brought his arms up to block Hermann from rapping him on the head with the handle of his cane, but he wasn't quite fast enough. "Ow! Hey! That's copilot abuse! I'm an abused copilot! You don't see Mako doing this to Raleigh!"

"That's because Mr. Becket has the good sense God gave a golden retriever, and you aren't even a Ranger besides," said Hermann tartly. "Also, I believe we've already exhausted the subject of your poor self-preservation skills. Which brings us back to the fact that I would appreciate it if you not make comments that seem as though you are making a pass at my wife."

Newton could practically feel the annoyance bubbling up in Hermann's mind, but that's really all it was. No matter the bluster, his companion was not even far enough along to be angry, let alone the sort of livid his demeanor was trying to imply. "You do realize that we're both talking about Vanessa like she isn't here when she's still on a call with us, right?"

Color flooded Hermann's face. "You are a terrible influence. I retract all offers of hospitality effective immediately," he snapped, though his words lacked conviction.

From the computer, Vanessa chuckled. "Sorry, liebchen, but I'm going to have to overrule you on that one. He says he can cook and watching you two is just too damn funny. When are you bringing him home?"


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just some more random fluff. Picking at these random ficbits has been a nice way for me to relieve some stress. Still no promises of this amounting to more than just a string of ficlets that are in the same general continuity.

Man, if only Newt could find a way to travel back in time (or at least open a temporal flux corridor, which, given what he'd picked up from the Precursors about the Breach, might be doable, but boy was that a mental conversation he needed to wait to have some other time), he could warn his past self about what a surreal experience his life was about to become. He would also tell himself to stop stealing Hermann's food items from the lab minifridge because, one day, Hermann would be privy to all of his darkest secrets (see point the first). Not that he didn't have other, more interesting secrets, but he got the feeling that _this one thing_ was going to be the thing he never heard the end of.

"If I had realized that your eating habits were so appalling, I might have endeavored to keep more nutritionally balanced snack items on hand," Hermann said casually over the box of personal effects he was packing. "A diet consisting entirely of purloined baby carrots, instant noodles, and questionable sandwich meat can't be good for you."

"Oh my _God_ ," Newt shouted. "Are you sure you're a real person and not some android engineered explicitly to make me want to strangle panda cubs?" He huffed and tossed another of his notebooks into his own bin of personal items. He'd thought about just chucking all of them into the ocean, but the urge, on further examination, tasted distinctly Gottliebian in nature. So he resisted. Hermann might want to forget about the entire world-almost-ending thing, but Newt knew it was his duty to commemorate it through preserving, maybe even continuing, his research.

When he looked over at his partner, Hermann's face was schooled in the best approximation of "guileless" that he could manage. Which wasn't that great, given the fact he was obviously fighting down a smirk. God. Hermann Gottlieb was yanking his chain (which was nothing new since they sniped at each other all the time), but in a downright friendly way. So. Weird.

Not that it was subjectively weirder than any of the other stuff that he'd noticed since he and Hermann took a detour through each others' psyches on their field-trip to the kaiju hivemind. In fact, when he ranked most of the events from the past week on a subjective weirdness scale, it was pretty freaking banal. But Hermann's acerbic needling had been such a huge touchstone of the past decade that Newt keenly noticed its lack.

He thumbed through another notebook before tossing it in with the rest. Tradition suddenly seemed like a very important thing to uphold in that moment. "Dude, you've taken a look into the seedy underbelly of my brain. You've seen all the illicit inter-departmental flings and kinky sexual shenanigans I've gotten up to on your side of the lab, and _this_ is the thing you focus on? You've got to be kidding me."

The words had their desired effect; he saw Hermann's spine stiffen and his face pinched up and the world was suddenly incredibly normal. "I saw no such-- you didn't--" he spluttered.

"Oh, I totally _did_ ," Newt replied, relishing both the dawning horror in Hermann's expression and the confused undercurrent in the background radiation of Hermann's thoughts ( _there's no way he could've I would've noticed I didn't see anything like that but we were stressed I was thinking of other things_ ). "Kaylee and I had this thing going where we tried to do the dirtiest things we could think of without smudging your equations back in Lima, and that Audrey girl, well, the stuff she did hanging from that ladder was pretty crazy. Oh, and then there was that intern, Carlos! I think we christened every flat surface in the lab before he transferred to Panama. And then there was Dr. Isley..."

Hermann's face had grown redder and blotchier as Newt spun out his (hopefully) totally plausible falsehoods, but at the mention of Dr. Isley, he let out a relieved bark of laughter. "Well, now I know you're lying," he said.

Out of habit, Newt responded with an affronted glare. "Come on, man. A guy like you can put a ring on Vanessa, but a woman like Pamela is out of my league?"

Hermann snorted. "This has nothing to do with yours, my, Vanessa's, or Dr. Isley's perceived 'league' and everything to do with the fact that I categorically and unequivocally know that Dr. Isley is a lesbian."

" _What_." Newt's jaw dropped. "No way! First off: how the hell would you know this both 'categorically' and 'unequivocally?' Second: No, really, _how_. And third: wow, Hermann, that is literally the most obnoxiously British way to out somebody I've ever heard. And you're German."

"I know this," Hermann said, pointedly ignoring the last comment, "because she was impressed with an article I had written several years ago, and she asked me out to drinks. What time we did not spend discussing work, she filled with anecdotes about her wife. I learned over the course of the evening that she and her wife have been together since K-Day, that her wife is a psychiatrist at a well-regarded hospital in New England, and that Dr. Isley is quite devoted to her."

Newt rocked back on his heels and let out a low whistle. "Whoever she is, she's a lucky woman. But, you got, me, I have not once engaged in kinky sex on your side of the lab." He let the unspoken "but my side of the lab is a different story" dangle like a length of fresh kaiju entrails, but Hermann was having no more of this particular line of thinking. Newt barely managed to raise his arm in enough time to bat Hermann's cane away before it rapped him on the skull. "Dude, what is with this sudden propensity toward physical violence?"

"This is hardly what anyone would call 'sudden,'" said Hermann stiffly. "I have been hurling chalk at you for years to no effect. It's only been recently that you've begun staying within range of something with which I possess impeccable aim."

"Hey, to hear you tell it, my head's so big it's impossible to miss," Newt replied. He was trying for "affable" but the words flew straight past it and landed squarely in "fond" territory. Ugh. If he hadn't already committed to moving into Hermann's spare room, Newt was pretty sure he would be feeling chagrined.

He tossed another notebook into his box and taped it shut. "Hey, d'you feel like finding out if that Burger King off Tong Chun is still standing? I think I'll strangle myself with my tie if I have to eat in the mess one more time."

"Your taste in food is appalling," Hermann grumbled, likewise taping up the box he had been filling. "I refuse to leave the Shatterdome just for the sake of a third-rate, greasy hamburger. We're going to eat somewhere _nice_ , and that's final."


End file.
